Johnny Cash’s childhood home is up for heritage listing

The childhood home of legendary country music star, Johnny Cash, is being considered for heritage listing by the US National Register of Historic Places after being restored.

The decision will be made next week when the Arkansas Historic Preservation Program review board meets.

The humble home is located in a town called Dyess, in north-eastern Arkansas and less than an hours drive from Memphis, Tennessee.

The home was built in 1934, two years after Johnny Cash was born. It remained in the family until they sold it in 1954.

Cash was an iconic American country music star. Image: getty

The house and 40 acres of farming land were provided to the Cash family during the Great Depression as part of a federal government economic recovery plan.

During the Great Depression, Dyess was organised into a farming cooperative that grew and sold its crops collectively as part of a New Deal program to rescue the area from severe poverty.

Cash's home before the restoration. Image: Arkansas State university

The home was altered by the owners that bought the property from the Cash family, who installed modern tile flooring, panelling and wallpaper. In order for the home to meet the criteria for heritage listing, these had to be ripped out.

To qualify for nomination, the home required completion of a full restoration to take it back to it’s original structure and look. This was done in 2014 and luckily, the original flooring was still there and intact under the modern tiled floors.

After the restoration. Image: Arkansas State University

The restoration project was done by Arkansas State University, who purchased the then dilapidated property and held a fund raising concert in order to restore it and allow it to be considered for heritage listing.

"The house retains much of its original 1930s vernacular/Colonial Revival design," the nomination form says. "The property retains the feeling of a farmhouse from the 1930s-era Dyess Colony."

Preservation Program spokesman Mark Christ told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: "They go through a rigorous internal determination of eligibility before going to the board, so if a nomination makes it through both of those processes, it's definitely a property that should be listed”.